Birthday party dilemma

[Stella_luna]

Please help me with a birthday drama dilemma . . .

My DD has become very good friends with two girls on the bus, and she just told me she wants to invite them to her 6th birthday party. However, there are *four* girls from her class who live in our neighborhood and all five of them sit together on the bus. I don't know why, but DD insists that she doesn't want to invite the other two girls. I feel like *not* inviting them will hurt their feelings (I feel like there's no way DD and the two girls she wants to invite will avoid talking about the party). Or do kids this age not care? (I know DD wouldn't care, but nothing bugs that kid, so she's not a good gauge.)

Add in the fact that inviting all 4 of them would result in 15 kids coming to this party (:!)

What would you do?

[gingerstar]

Wow, mama, before I vote I have to know, how do you feel? Can you run a party of 15 little 6 yo girls!? I did 8 last spring, oh boy....
That is a tough question. I think it boils down to what can you do?

[Jessy1019]

There are kids in our family that we basically have to invite, so when it comes to friends, I would never make my kids invite people they didn't like to their parties.

Besides, dd would tell the other kids she didn't really want to invite them. She's pretty honest.

[amcal]

If they just sit together on the bus because they live in the same neighborhood but aren't friends outside of that situation, I'd say there's no reason you would be under obligation to invite them.

[beka1977]

Are you friends with the other girls families?

[Stella_luna]

Thanks for the answers so far, they are very helpful. beka: we are not friends with any of the families--we've never met any of them (in fact, I've never met any of these 4 girls)--we are pretty new to the neighborhood and don't really know any kids here yet.

[lovebug]

i would just invite the 2. im an adult and i get mad at DH when he says i have to invite "all" the military wifes to a non military party's if i want to invite any. : i dont but it is a point of conflict!

[kennedy444]

While 11 kids already is a lot I couldn't invite the other/bus friends and not invite the neigbhborhood kids. My kid always had lots of kids at their bday parties. Yeah, its a lot of work and can great crazy but hey, it's only one day and it's only for a short period of time (2-3 hours). You will survive!


We sometimes run into this problems since there are four other boys on my street that are all in the same grade as my son; not to mention the three slightly older boys that also hang out with this little band of boys. They've been friendly for years and so we always start our list with them and then add in school friends.

[wrzos]

I can't imagine that many at a party! I voted to only invite the 2 she wants, but I'd also want to cull the list down from 11 somehow. Are they family or something? I like the concept of keeping the number of guests close to the childs age....

[CarrieMF]

I'd invite all 4 of them. 15 kids invited does not mean all 15 will be there & really it is only 2 more kids than what you were already inviting.

[dharmamama]

It's your dd's party. Let her invite who she wants. Maybe the other two girls aren't particularly pleasant kids and they all sit together out of convenience or something. I think my kids are the best judges of who they want to be around.

dm

[mommy68]

I would let her invite who she wants to invite. It's her party. And I agree that at
6 yrs old she is likely to tell the kids she didn't want at the party that she didn't want them there and hurt their feelings. They will probably never know about the party anyway so I wouldn't invite them. If they were in her class I would feel more obligated to invite them.

[Terrilein]

I'd say invite the 2 girls your dd likes. But 11 kids already invited! Wow! You must have the patience of an angel. I like to stick to the age = number of invitations rule (i.e. dd is 6, so only 6 invitations) myself and keep it simple.

Have fun!

[TiredX2]

Originally Posted by mommy68

And I agree that at
6 yrs old she is likely to tell the kids she didn't want at the party that she didn't want them there and hurt their feelings.

Is that really normal 6 year old behavior? Wow.

That said, I would vote for a smaller party and only the two girls. If you are inviting 11 kids already (or 13?) I would include all 4. If a party is very small it's easy to understand why you aren't invited, if there are LOTS of kids invited, its harder to understand.

Do you know why she doesn't want to invite them? Does she think the party is just getting too big, does she not actually like them...? Also, does she not want to invite them, or does she want to NOT invite them (see the difference)?

[Teensy]

How many girls are in her class at school? If there are eight or fewer, I'd only invite the two your daughter wants. If you can invite all four girls and still be NOT inviting over half the girls in the class, I would probably go ahead and do it. It is a chance for the children to get to know each other better, it is a nice thing to do, and the odds are that at least one of the girls won't be able to attend anyway.

[zeldamomma]

Its hard to say without knowing why she doesn't want to invite the other 2 girls. Has she never liked them, or is she just mad at them this week?

If you don't end up inviting them, I would use it as an opportunity to teach her how to invite her two friends discretely.

ZM

[Mizelenius]

11 kids is seriously enough, esp. since many parents don't stick around to help. Invite the other 2 over to hang out sometime.

[limabean]

I always thought the "rule" was that if you passed out invitations at school, you had to invite everyone (or at least all of the same gender) in the class, but if you passed out invitations privately, you could just invite those classmates you wanted.

[tanya1976]

Just the two. If she's only comfortable with these two, then leave it be. Why make her uncomfortable by inviting people that she doesn't want there?